Vice Adm. Thomas Moore: NAVSEA Plans to Modify Maintenance Contract Strategy With Private Shipyards

U.S. Navy Vice Adm. Thomas Moore, head of Naval Sea Systems Command, has said NAVSEA plans to introduce changes to the multiple-award contract/multi-order strategy in an effort to improve the contracting process with private shipyards for maintenance work, USNI News reported Wednesday.

NAVSEA has started a pilot program that aims to combine ship maintenance availabilities to provide private yards with a “little more stable and predictive work” and facilitate on-time delivery of ships, Moore said Tuesday at the American Society of Naval Engineers’ Fleet Maintenance and Modernization Symposium.

“My goal is eventually that we will eventually – on each coast – bundle availabilities six months at a time… so you can know at least what work you can have in the next six months and beyond,” he noted.

The service plans to test the strategy through repair work on the USS Gunston Hall (LSD-44) amphibious warship and two guided-missile destroyers, USS Bulkeley (DDG 84) and USS Arleigh Burke (DDG-51).

Moore said the Navy wants both public and private yards to complete ship maintenance work on time as the service ramps up its readiness efforts driven by the Defense Department’s new warfare strategy against potential adversaries.